This video really opened my eyes to animals lives, and what we have done to them. First off when the video was talking about Rapunzel I didn't think her story was that bad, until I realized that she had no "social skills" or any idea how to treat a silver back. She was showing aggressive behavior to the dominant male and he went into attack mode. Rapunzel then and there could have died and she was lucky she didn't. Imagine possibly dying because of something out of your control. If she was born and raised in the wild then she would have known how to respect and treat a silver back or any elder. Rapunzel had a bad story but Ivan's was even worse! In the book his life sounded bad but in the video the shocking reality was even more depressing! His life was sugar coated in the book, it said he was living in the mall with other animals and a glass cage with one concrete wall. When we saw his real cage there was nobody but people and himself, he was all alone in his concrete cage. I would call it a domain but that would require it being a home. This was his prison. In his eyes you could see how depressed and alone he felt and I would to. Head drooped down, slouching while staring into space waiting for something, anything to happen other than people pointing and staring at him... "Look mom see the monkey he's looking at me!". How would it feel to be Ivan? Living all alone people trying to make you smile, really do anything other than stare into space. You could see the emptiness in his eyes as he stared into your soul. My empathy was beyond compare I felt so bad for him. What did he ever do to deserve such a life? The good thing is he ended up in a zoo before he died. I think that gorillas need to be in special zoos. What I mean by that is they need almost exact models of the wild, be raised by a gorilla and grow up around their own kind. They need zoo keepers like the guy they showed at the end playing with 20 or so gorillas. People who enjoy spending time with them. The video changed my thoughts on zoos and on my perspective of animals. I hope that no animal has to live like Ivan.
